Monday, March 7, 2011

"Out Proctor" with George Hunt Williamson: a Marginally Serious Exploration Searching for Shamballa

Out Proctor we go on this winding path [for those who don't know what the expression in this blog of "Out Proctor" means, search it and it will become horrifyingly clear---in brief, it means that we are talking about something that is at a high-probability of being nonsense, at least in the approach we're going on at the moment]. Shamballa is certainly a concept of great intrigue and fun, and who knows if there is anything to it? We'll walk a bit with one person who not only believed that there was something to it, but that there were SEVEN Shamballa/Shangri-las. One must never underrate George Hunt Williamson on anything.Here's our boy: GHW was one of the most imaginative adventurers that the planet has seen. As a few of you know, in his later years he went to live with a female companion, Thelma Dunlap, where he hoped to wrap up all his unique ideas in several books---none of which occurred by the time of his death. Ms. Dunlap kept his files until her own death, when they were passed on to Florida UFO bookseller Bob Girard. He then sold most [98%] of them to me. I bought them not because I felt that the secrets of the Universe were to be revealed therein, but because GHW was, in his way, important to UFO history, and, like Adamski, his files and thoughts should be preserved. I've never regretted spending that money, as GHW's files have been a great imaginative ride, and often a wild Hoot of a read. This "holding" in my archives allows me to present GHW's idiosyncratic view on a subject interesting to many people, here. This is not going to be comprehensive. That would take a book chapter at least. But, since we're in this one for fun, perhaps a skimming will still be worth it.

GHW was convinced by [essentially] trance-control mediumship that there had been in the ancient era an "elder race" who had inhabited Earth, built a great civilization, and "vanished" both to Space and to the "underworld". They were the source of both Atlantis-type myths and the UFOs. Because GHW felt that neither element of the Elders had actually disappeared, he wanted to go looking for them. Going after the UFOs was a bit out-of-his control [though he tried that, too], but going after the Masters of Atlantis et al was not. He could go looking on Earth for them. But where to search??

One of his inspirations was a man named Brown Landone. [picture at left]. Landone is rather indescribable. Born in the 19th century, he was sort-of a writer and historian, who dedicated a large part of his life to peace-activism and utopian visioning. Something led him into what we would call an "occult" view of these matters, and his personal search for examples of ancient utopians of Egyptian and earlier times. He came to believe that much of the Atlantaean myth was reality, that certain mathematical forms had truths imbedded in them which revealed ancient wisdom, and that a "new order" of priesthood [and a new Temple] should be initiated. So, he began to write more and more esoteric essays and pamphlets about all this.

GHW was impressed. There is one of Landone's pamphlets in the collection which directly addresses Shangri-la. It's short but GHW read it avidly, re-writing every word in his notes. The title, which is surely an extension of Landone's thinking in the small book represented on the left, reads: "The Seven Shangri-las, Seven Known Horizons". In this pamphlet Landone states with no caveat that there still exist seven temples maintained by a elder "brotherhood" in widespread locations around the world. He goes on to briefly [vaguely] locate each one, and say a bit in his defense as to why /how he knows each to be true.

GHW seems to have taken Landone's ideas as a rough outline for his personal exploration. In his files, there are indications that he took every one of the seven seriously. Some of these became much more central to his mental adventuring than others, but in this and the following posts, I'll try to give a little of the flavor of what each meant to him---sometimes this was just a note-it-and-let-it-go type of thing; sometimes this was a major element in his personal life. In today's post, I'll take Landone's first-listed Shangri-la and, piecemeal, bounce down through the list in posts to come.Stop #one on the Shamballa Temple trail is Venezuela. Exactly why, who knows?? Landone claimed that a [unnamed] traveler had seen the Venezuelan Shangri-la in 1925. He was lost in high mountain jungles and entered a secret city "surrounded on all sides by deep chasms". These people were informed about events taking place in the rest of the world, despite having no apparent means whereby to know them. In 1936, it was seen again from the cockpit of a wayward small plane. They described the land as a bowl of green vegetation in the high mountains. Within that land were seen temples. The troubled plane flew to the East and found flat land ultimately to land upon. Landone hinted that his "brotherhood" knew the location of the place.

Well, the general area he is speaking of certainly contains some neat things. One of them [on the left] is Angel Falls, perhaps the tallest significant volume waterfall anywhere, and rather magnificent regardless. One could imagine this natural wonder falling from Shangri-la-ish heights except for the fact that this area of southern Venezuela has been thoroughly explored ever since it became a tourist attraction. Still, one can get one's imagination going just by looking at the flat table mountain from which it comes.

Another slightly less well explored area nearby is the Roraima plateau. This has the exact immediate impression of a world isolated and far up into the clouds. A perfect Shangri-la. Unfortunately another wonderful fantasy has already beaten Shangri-la in its claim to the premises: A.Conan Doyle's LOST WORLD. People have taken the claims of still-existing dinosaurs on the Roraima plateau just as seriously as Landone takes Shangri-la. There have been claims of seeing wheeling Pterosaurs above the escarpment right into the latter half of the 20th century. But alas for all that, there have been many expeditions to explore Roraima by now and nary a "extinct" plant let alone the Pterosaurs. Unusual species yes; species from the Cretaceous period, no. I wish...but, no. So, to find Landone's or GHW's Venezuelan Shamballa, we need to go further into the wild mountains than Roraima. But where?? It's a big country as you can see in the map below. To aid you in your quest [and I know several of you are making your travel arrangements now] I've put a map below. It has Angel Falls [A] and Roraima [R] encircled, and has the line connecting Caracas and Manaus [on the Amazon] noted. Maybe an area where small planes might fly and get off course?? And just to be extra helpful, I've circled the minute [Hah!!] area which I recommend you search. If you survive the "violent tribes" that Landone says live there, please let the rest of us know how it went.

5 comments:

"Landone claimed that a [unnamed] traveler had seen the Venezuelan Shangri-la in 1925."

1925 is the same year that Percy Fawcett disappeared into the jungles of Brazil while searching for the Lost City of Z. But I doubt that is related to Shangri-La.

Anyway, a number of anthropologists/archaeologists have been saying that there was a large civilization in the Amazon, nothing like Shangri-La of course, but impressive nevertheless. However, The Washington Post tells us that the missionary Gaspar de Carvajal claimed to see "cities that gleamed white" along with the more prosaic "canoes that carried dozens of Indian warriors, 'fine highways' and 'very fruitful land.'" They've found the fruitful land, the fine highways and the Indian warriors are a given so who knows what else is out there?

Yes, the lost "white city" of the Amazon and its connection with the Percy Fawcett saga is another fascinating adventure tale. It interested GHW because he viewed most of that stuff as remnants of the ancient "Atlantaean" elder race. GHW called that South American civilization "Paititi" and went searching for that as well. I don't think that he ever connected that with Landone's Venezuelan claim, however.

After much tedious research, I have finally been able to determine the final resting place of author and adventurer George Hunt Williamson to be included on Find-a-Grave. If you know this name, please drop by and add a vote at the bottom of this memorial to help the page keep its "famous" rating. http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=99822446

When GHW died he was living with a wealthy older woman named Thelma Dunlap. She preserved his files. For reasons unknown to me, she knew Bob Girard very well, and trusted him as a truly caring person about things in the world of anomalies {she was correct about that}, and upon her death willed the files to him. Bob Girard was a book dealer in UFO and anomalous phenomena literature, and so he naturally went about trying to find a home for the files while supporting his business at the same time. He advertised the files {unfortunately} in three pieces. One was the George Adamski material. A second was a file on the alleged Solex Mal language. Lastly was the bulk of the about four filing cabinets of materials on everything else. The Adamski and Solex Mal materials were sold before I knew about what Bob was doing. But I did purchase the bulk to preserve it for future researchers. Bob was a friend and was very happy that they were going to someone who would actually care about them "in perpetuity".

Not having the Adamski piece does emasculate the collection a little, but not as much as one would think. Nevertheless, persons visiting the collection will not find highly organized materials {usually} nor easy answers to their questions. Digging is required and a commitment to synthetic intellectual work. I have one correspondent who continually asks me for "little favors" with no concept whatever as to the hassle he's requesting. The collection is visitable in person by any responsible individual who wants to come to Kalamazoo when I am in residence {which now that Mom has passed is the vast majority of the time}. I need some warning about this. As to e-mail addresses: professional courtesy would have brought YOU to the opinion that it is YOUR job to inform me of your address, not mine to publish my own. This omission concerns me a little.